Harvest of Bones (7 page)

“Look what you made me do!” she yelled out the car window. But the cat just sat there, pulling burrs out of its tender paw.

She looked around to see if anyone had heard the crunch, but all was quiet. Aunty was inside being interviewed by the girl next door, so she wouldn’t have heard. And Fay was in the barn, probably cursing the old cow. Only Gandalf came trotting out of the barn, excited to see her. “Good boy.” She was safe for the moment anyway; she’d inspect the damage later. She hugged the dog, unpacked her stuff. No, she’d sweep first. She didn’t want to sleep in mouse turd, did she?

“There’s one, Gandalf. A mouse, see? In the grass over there. Go sic ‘em. Good boy!”

And she smiled to hear the dog digging as she swung her broom.

She was mopping up the bedroom floor of the trailer—it sloped more than ever since the car had hit the side—when she heard a scream nearby in the barn. She arrived, to find a pail of milk knocked over and streaming along the sawdust-covered floor. Fay was doing some kind of dance, one foot in the air, and the other solidly on the floor—oh, and pinned down by the Holstein’s left rear foot!

“Get off. Off you miserable beast!” Fay screamed, and the cow looked beseechingly at Hartley, like she’d forgotten how to move her legs. Hartley tugged on the foot while Dandelion bellowed and Fay hollered, her face a mask of pain. But the foot wouldn’t move. Until Hartley pulled an apple out other pocket and rolled it on the floor. Dandelion stared at it a minute, then lifted her hind leg and scooped up the fruit with her plump lips. She turned, chewing, the yellow juice oozing out of the corner other mouth, to stare innocently at Fay.

“She didn’t mean it,” said Hartley, patting the cow’s rump. “Your foot just got in her way, that’s all.”

“I’m sending her back.” Fay sank down on the three-legged stool. “I don’t care if I paid a six months’ rent. Jesus, I can’t feel my toes.” She stuck up a limp foot at Hartley.

“I’ll milk her, then,” said Hartley. “I like the old thing. That farmer girl next door will teach me. The one you said helped you—that Emily.”

“She’s here now, interviewing Glenna.” Fay was clinging to Hartley’s shoulder, massaging the numb foot.

“I know. Poor kid. Aunty’s so unpredictable. She’ll be all sweetness and love and make up a dozen stories, or else slam the door on her—who knows?”

“Uh-oh, what did I tell you?” she went on, hearing the farmhouse door slam. “Aunty’s thrown her out. Rescue mission number two coming up!” She whirled about. Or was it the trailer, fallen in on someone’s head? She’d have to fess up about that.

“Don’t leave me with this beast!” Fay cried. “She’ll sit on
me
next.”

Hartley just laughed.

* * * *

Emily was on her way home, the notebook under her arm, when she saw the greyhound at the side of the trailer, peering into what looked like a large hole. She was amazed at the size of the hole; one would think the trailer itself had dropped into a pit. Or was it an earthquake? The foundation appeared to have caved in. Vermont was on a fault, she’d heard. She wondered if the B and B woman knew about it, or that girl Hartley, whom she’d met briefly the night before when she came to set up a time for the interview.

Emily turned back to take a look. Actually, she was interested in the greyhound; she’d heard about its plight, how badly it had been treated—not unlike putting that old lady in a nursing home, she guessed. She remembered her grandmother before she died—her mother’s mother, who had died of a brain tumor. She’d looked awful at the end, like a shrunken white mouse. A wave of sympathy swept over her for Glenna and the greyhound; they even looked alike, with those pointy noses, though Glenna was whiter and the greyhound grayer. Well, she was sorry already for thinking ill of Glenna. Poor thing.

Her mother, now she was still young enough to put things right. Pull the family back together. But her mother did nothing, never even asked her father to come back. Just felt sorry for herself, that’s all. One of these days, she and Emily would have a showdown.

The hound was practically in the hole now. Its gaunt rear end stuck up like the back of a bulldozer. It was good-natured, she’d heard, but she’d keep her distance anyway. The dog looked up when she approached, ears back, like it was afraid
of her;
then it crouched in the dirt, as though guilty of something.

“What have you got there, big boy? A nice juicy bone?” She risked a hand, but the dog retreated. She peered in the hole. For a moment, she thought she was seeing double. The bones were connected—and covered with dirt and shreds of discolored clothing. And something like a pointed rock stuck through a filthy shirt! She put a hand to her nose, though there was only the thick smell of earth. A gust of wind blew a pile of dead leaves in her face, and the bones seemed to move. She shivered.

And then she screamed.

* * * *

Glenna was taking a walk across the back pasture. Sun out bright after a night of freezing rain—everything shining: rocks, the rusty maples, the white birches, their leaves spinning like gold coins. The mountains, gleaming purple and black. God but she loved it here. She loved Vermont, and she loved her farm, shrunk though it was now. It was once five hundred acres, rich with merino sheep brought from Spain by Glenna’s great-grandfather; he’d sold their fine oily wool as far off as Argentina and South Africa. Glenna still had a yellowy news clipping of her great-grandfather mourning the loss of Gold Nugget, his best ram, valued at $25,000. She’d like to have that kind of money now! But after World War I, her grandfather turned to dairy cows; when she was a child, a herd of Jerseys grazed in the meadow that still stretched to the foothills of the Green Mountains. Glenna’s father had been no farmer, though. No businessman, either—he’d had a talent only for making the wrong investments.

Now there were a mere hundred acres, a single ragtag cow rented by that Fay creature, standing like a silhouette in the noon sun. Even her mother had kept a few cows after her father’s runaway horse dragged him over the ledges that time and cracked open his head. . . . They’d laid him out on the horsehair sofa—her white dress got splashed with blood. But it was horses Glenna loved. And then her nephew Homer went and put down her beloved Jenny Two. And drove Glenna down to the city. She’d hardly wanted to live after that.

She had a stick, for the meadow was full of chuck holes. No one to keep it up the way her mother used to: out all day picking stone, mending fence, a tiny woman with muscles like small round rocks. Glenna had to admire her. Herself, Glenna used to ride through the meadow—bareback, too, no saddle for her! She was young and fit then, free as a wild finch; she and Jenny’d take any of those damn fences like a stallion. Should have been one—her parents disappointed she turned out a girl. Even so, they made a boy out of her. Kept her close to the farm: chores every day, turned away any boy came near, though not many did—that Flint nose! The tall, flat Flint body with its size-eleven feet. Till one day, when she was eighteen, the body blossomed. Boys came around then. She had to give two or three of them that big foot.

One of them had it in for her after that, kept hanging around, stuck on himself—stuck on something else he wanted from her—couldn’t think now who, what it was. One day he—or someone else, some other man... Her mind blurred. Something that happened, that kept coming up, from somewhere in her past—trapped now in the bottom of the mind.

But no local boy was ever her match. No one was, not even the college boys—to them, she was just the “local girl.” Though she did all right in college, hard as it was when she had to live at home. Won a writing prize once, swore she’d be a journalist—though nothing ever came of it. Other things took over her life. But those college boys! She didn’t hold with their foolishness anyway. Fraternity boys, acting like children.

Till Mac MacInnis came along. She was working in that New York printers’ union, riding the train to work—missing the farm. She called home every weekend, worried about Mother. Mac was plug-ugly—she was a Venus by contrast. He was a good two inches shorter than she, fringe of rusty hair arranged around a bald spot, those bad teeth. But for all that, he had something. He could talk—never mind it was mostly lies. It was a power struggle from the start. Who could outwit whom. He could talk a streak all right! He’d made Mother laugh now and then.

But he didn’t like the farm. When Glenna told him she was moving back, fed up with cities, Mother needing help— Parkinson’s bending her in half, the poor eyesight—he put his foot down. He wasn’t going. “All right, then,” she’d said, “don’t. Stay here with your damn proofreading. Let ’em pay you ten cents an inch, exploit the hell out of you. I’m going home.”

But two weeks later, there he was, unannounced. He’d been fired by the
Times.
She found him squatting in the farmhouse kitchen, his dainty small feet up on the table; he was guzzling her best scotch. Mother smiling at some joke he’d told. “Hi, there,” he said, “got any vermouth? I’d really prefer a Manhattan.”

And that’s how she remembered him best. Feet up, guzzling booze. Her booze. Lost his job, so he lived off her. She made him sleep alone, of course—who’d want a liquory-breathed man to sleep with? She never cared for that part of marriage anyway. Way he did it, he just stuck it in, no sweet words, no preamble, just bullish. And thought he was some Don Juan. Oh, sure. A whole six or seven years it was till she got fed up. Even Mother agreed. He wouldn’t throw a stick on the woodstove while she and Mother were out with the cows.

And then one night they had it out. Hard to remember exactly—her mind did quirky things these days—but it was bad, she remembered that. It began with that open grave—the hole he said he’d dug for her horse; he wouldn’t fill it in. She had to step around it to get to the barn. Then they’d had a cow down with mastitis; she was giving it penicillin. Another cow freshening at the same time, in trouble. Tried to call the vet— he’d have to drag the calf out with a chain. But the vet busy somewhere else, so she begged Mac to help; he came, but just leaned against the stanchion and watched. Complained about the smell, the manure on his New York shoes. She was furious. The cow died. The calf lived, but Mac just shrugged, said how homely it was.

“Better-looking than you,” she’d said, and he’d laughed. “Or you,” he said. “You look more like your mother every day.”

It was too much for her. She went at him with a stick. Took him by surprise—she was bigger, stronger than he was—he keeled right over backward. The cow kicked up a pile of sawdust then and she couldn’t see. A minute later, Mac was up. He was going in the house to pack; he was leaving, he yelled, then stomped off. She went back to the cow. Someone standing in the barn door then. Who was it? Someone she knew anyway, a man. She couldn’t think; this was where her mind blanked. Where the nightmares began. Time passed; things happened. She just remembered riding off on Jenny Two, and when she got back, Mac was gone. And then that anonymous letter, someone who saw, saying she’d killed Mac.

But that hole. Who had filled it in? Herself? The letter said she had. She couldn’t remember. Couldn’t bring herself to dig it up and look. “Don’t go digging up trouble,” her mother had said. “Might not be anything at all in there. Mac just filled it in ’fore he left. Go, girl, make love to your horse.”

Glenna missed Mac, though, after that. Funny, but she missed the old bastard.

She’d reached the fence now; it divided her land from the Willmarths’. The other side was cleared pasture, not overgrown like hers with nettles, furze, goldenrod, black-eyed Susans. Smart, that Ruth Willmarth: she worked hard. But that daughter of hers, asking personal questions, Glenna didn’t like that. Meant well, she supposed. Glenna recalled how she’d had school projects, had to do them or flunk out. Well, she’d talk to the girl again sometime. Couldn’t let Alwyn Bagshaw have the upper hand, do all the talking. He’d better not talk about her, better not! You couldn’t trust a Bagshaw. Aw, the girl would come back. Glenna would see what she’d written. She liked that girl, to tell the truth. Seemed honest, practical—not so flighty as her nephew Homer’s girl, Hartley.

There was a lot of hollering back by the barn and trailer— Hartley again, she supposed, running after that fool dog. They said Glenna couldn’t see for the cataracts, ought to have them removed: No way! She saw enough. She supposed she’d have to go back and put a stop to the noise. Though she needed a nap—she was getting old. Didn’t like to think how old. But they weren’t putting her away like they tried with that greyhound. No ma’am. She’d fight. She’d die before she went to any Lands’ End.

“Call the police,” Ruth shouted over the barn phone, and Emily said, “I wanted to, but they wouldn’t let me.”

“Who wouldn’t let you?”

“That woman Fay, for one. She said the publicity would scare away her new boarder. And Glenna, too. It has nothing to do with her, she says; she doesn’t know how it got there. That girl, Hartley, dug the whole thing up—it was mostly covered with dirt when I saw it. But it’s too big for her husband, Glenna says. ‘It’s not Mac,’ she said. But she’s scared stiff of any police. Says they’ll come and put
her
away. Mom, everyone’s in hysterics here. Please come. Now.”

So Ruth left in the middle of cleaning stalls—droppings everywhere, Zelda’s calf mewing, needing to be bottle-fed, with Jane Eyre out in the fields now—she might have to call the vet, God forbid. She ran back to the barn and phoned Colm Hanna, just in case. She might need his help to calm that mad crew.

Colm would meet her there, he said. She’d caught him in the process of laying out a corpse for his father. “Don’t panic. Don’t let them upset you. I know Glenna. She had a to-do with Dad once, over her mother’s demise. Wouldn’t let him cremate, but wouldn’t bury her in one piece, either. ‘What’ll we do, keep her on ice till you make up your mind?’ Dad said. Glenna didn’t think that was funny.”

Colm obviously did; he even got Ruth laughing over the phone. He was good for her, Colm was, lightened her up; she tended to be overly serious, her dour Scottish genes. Sometimes, though, Colm’s joking around was too much. He didn’t always know when to stop. She flung an arm into a plaid jacket and ran out again.